Minutes of the meeting of the Board of Governors (BOG)
1. Welcome and Introductions
The meeting was called to order at 4:30PM. President O'Connell welcomed the attendees. Attendees introduced themselves.
2. Adoption of Agenda
The agenda of the meeting was approved.
3. Approval of Previous Minutes
The minutes of the previous meeting were corrected and approved.
4. President's Report (Brian O'Connell)
(a) ISTAS. ISTAS 2005 has just completed; Philip Chmielewski can't be thanked enough for its success. CPTED was a great addition to the conference. We welcome a continued relationship with that organization.
(b) International Conference on Medical Care Compunetics (ICMCC). The annual meeting was held at the Hague, June 1-3. Brian O'Connell spoke at plenary session. Michael Lightner, president-elect of IEEE also spoke at the plenary session. About 150 people attended. Swami Laxminarayan is involved with this group. Several European and Asian organizations expressed interest in SSIT and may invite us to arrange sessions at their conferences. Some conference attendees joined SSIT.
(c) Five-year Society Review. IEEE requires a society review every five years. The President and Editor will meet with the Society Review Committee at Chantilly, VA the third week of June and present a report on the Society. This involved filling out many forms and preparing many reports. There does not seem to be any trouble with the review. IEEE regards SSIT as a useful resource.
(d) Computer Society. At their Board of Governors meeting several members commented favorably on T&S Magazine. People want more pages. One member said it is the only IEEE publication that he reads from cover to cover.
(e) Robotics and Automation Society. This society held its annual meeting April 15-23 in Barcelona, Spain. Brian O'Connell spoke at a workshop on Robotics and Ethics. SSIT may co-sponsor another meeting on this topic.
(f) AAAI. (See attachment to previous minutes.) The American Association for Artificial Intelligence will hold a Symposium on Machine Ethics, November 3-6, 2005, in Arlington, VA. SSIT is a technical co-sponsor of this symposium. We will put together a panel for this. Brian O'Connell will speak on AI and patent law.
(g) Regional Activities. IEEE will hold a regional congress in November, 2005. Brian O'Connell and Clint Andrews will speak on the role of SSIT in local chapter activities.
5 Past President's Report / Division VI Director's Report (Clint Andrews)
(a) Executive Director. Not much has happened since April. IEEE still does not have an Executive Director, but this may change in a few weeks. The Board does not even know who the candidates are, but have agreed to a salary range.
(b) New Technology Discourses Initiative. This deals with new technologies that are arriving in the near future, and how IEEE should deal with them. It is hard for outsiders with good ideas in these new technologies to find support in IEEE.
6. Treasurer's Report (Karl Stephan, conveyed by Brian O'Connell)
(See attachment) Nothing much has changed since April. We are OK for now, barring any surprises. Membership is still increasing.
7. Publications Report (Loui / Herkert / Perusich)
(See attachment) There are a reasonable number of papers still coming in. The issue on engineering in the Middle East is coming along. Normally there are two special issues a year, but this is flexible. Subjects for the issues are committed up to March 2007; some ideas are brewing for special issues past that time.
8. Conference Reports
(a) ISTAS 2005 (Chmielewski). There were a disappointing number of attendees, perhaps about 50. Fewer local folk than expected attended. More attendees were expected from CPTED. The Gonzaga meeting probably did not interfere with us. Originally the two conferences were to be co-located, but Gonzaga was not interested in doing this. They, also, were disappointed in their draw.
(Discussion:) It is not clear how the proximity to ASEE affected attendance. We should think about this. Maybe ISTAS and ASEE should be held together. In general conferences are experiencing declining attendance.
(b) ISTAS 2006 (Brody). This is planned for June 9 and 10, 2006, at Queens College, Queens, New York. There were some problems using the library as a venue, as was originally planned. So the student union may be used instead. There is a pay parking lot under the union, but there is free parking elsewhere. The site is accessible by subway and bus. We can still use our own AV equipment and save money.
We are planning on 250 attendees, but this can easily be reduced up to 5 weeks before the conference. The food price looks to be about $85 per person. The base cost for a conference of 50 people would be $105 per person. The hotel is in downtown Flushing. There are other hotels that could be used. We might arrange a bus between the hotel and the conference. There is lots of Chinese food in the area. We might take advantage of the nature of the community by having some sort of multinational entertainment
We are going with a broad theme for the conference, but we at least need a title for the conference.
Queens College is part of the City College of NY. Their student group is large and active and could be brought in. Also the NYC IEEE group is large and could contribute to the conference. There are various other universities that can be contacted.
(Discussion:) The conference should have a broad theme, perhaps with specialized tracks within, like the ISTAS at Washington, DC. We should contact local high schools, and perhaps have a high school poster session. Intel might be interested in sponsoring this (comment by Richard Beckwith, Intel Research). They sponsor the Science Talent search. However, the final science fair has already been held by the time of our conference, which might affect interest.
The call for papers is needed by late July.
(c) ISTAS 2007. This may be in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, and sponsored by the Canadian National Research Council. This is fairly firm, but still under discussion. The proposed theme is "Citizen Engagement using Information Technology." The IBM software labs in Toronto may work with the NRC on the conference and supply attendees. There are two flights to Fredericton from Boston per day.
9. Committee Reports
(a) Fellows Committee. The committee is still under deliberation. Choosing fellows is not an easy process. Irv Engleson is head of our fellows committee.
(b) Membership. Membership is still climbing.
(c) Student Membership (Anesta). Emily Anesta has graduated and is now our GOLD (Graduates of the Last Decade) representative.
(d) Distinguished Lectures. (See attachment)
(e) Virtual Community. The community is still active. There is some overseas activity. Kirsty Bellman offered to give advise on how to keep a virtual community active.
(f) Awards. The Barus Award will be presented to Dr. Kym Harvin at Rutgers. Not date has been settled yet since this needs to be coordinated with Congressman Rush Holt, who will present to award. We should construct some sort of event around this. The expected date is early September. The Board of Governor's meeting will be held on the same date.
(g) Educational Activities (Schipke). We need an educational resources page on our web site.
10. Liaison Reports
No reports.
11. Old Business
No old business.
12. New Business
Phil Chmielewski will be given a recognition award for his work on ISTAS 2005.
The "Triple Helix" is a student organization that spans several universities. They put out a journal on science, technology, and the law. We should interact with them, perhaps by creating a best paper award, or hosting a meeting.
13. Next Meeting Data and Place
The next Board of Governor's meeting will be at Rutgers University in September. The date is not yet settled (see 9f).
14. Adjournment
The meeting was adjourned at 6:05 PM.
Attendees at the June 10, 2005 Meeting
NAME AFFILIATION EMAIL (@ replaced with #) Clinton Andrews SSIT BOG; Div. VI c.j.andrews#ieee.org Emily Anesta SSIT eanesta#wpi.edu Richard Beckwith Intel Research Terri Bookman T&S Managing editor t.bookman#ieee.org Roberta Brody SSIT BOG roberta_brody#qc.edu Philip Chmielewski Loyola Marymount Univ. pchmiele#lmu.edu Barry Davidson ICA Ken Foster SSIT BOG Joe Herkert Editor T&S joe_herkert#ncsu.edu Bradley Kjell Secretary kjell#ieee.org John Laprise SSIT j-laprise#northwestern.edu Michael Loui SSIT BOG Brian O'Connell President oconnellb#ccsu.edu James Pfafflin IAS Rae C. Schipke SSIT schipker#ccsu.edu Jeff Sullivan SSIT; Cornell jms276#cornell.edu